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Mallard: Don't count Romney out yet

Recent polls show a lead opening up between President Obama and Mitt Romney nationally and in most swing states, but predicting this presidential election is tricky.

In addition to the usual issues, candidates, polls and debates, three somewhat unique factors complicate this election. All three tilt in favor of the Republican nominee, not always accidentally.

First, constitutionally-mandated congressional redistricting, and its impact on Electoral College vote distribution, resulted in 12 states losing seats in the House and an equal number of presidential electors.

Ten of those states were in the Obama column in 2008. After redistricting, if Obama gets the same states in 2012 as he won in 2008, he will have six less electoral votes due entirely to redistricting. Although he won in 2008 by a wide margin in the Electoral College, no one is predicting a victory like that this year and a loss of six electoral votes could be significant in an election predicted to be close.

After all, George W. Bush won in 2000 with only one electoral vote more than he needed.

The second factor this year is a new one and stems from the Supreme Court decision in Citizens United vs. the FEC, which allowed the influx of enormous and anonymous amounts of cash now flowing into campaigns. The case was a simple enough one, testing when political ads by opponents can be aired during campaigns, but the Supreme Court asked the litigants to broaden the scope to campaign finance in general and their decision threw many of the rules out the window.

There are still limits on contributions to candidates, but Political Action Committees and now corporations can run ads independently of the campaigns and, thanks to the action of the U.S. Congress, remain completely anonymous. There is an avalanche of spending by PACs now, especially in swing states, and virtually no restraint on what they can collect, spend and say.

When the candidate’s voice and face don’t appear at the end “approving this message,” anything goes.

Wealthy donors will spend tens of millions of dollars with total spending for all congressional and presidential campaigns combined estimated to be almost $6 billion and Republicans will out spend Democrats significantly. Worse, those contributions come with strings attached.

Finally, several state legislatures have passed voter suppression legislation aimed at making it harder to register and to vote. Georgia got on this bandwagon early with its government-issued photo ID requirement to vote and 19 states have passed similar laws.

Georgia’s law has been upheld by the courts, but a few are running into some judicial resistance. If that weren’t enough, some states are making it much tougher to conduct voter registration drives by requiring unnecessary and burdensome administrative requirements. And several states are restricting voter access to the polls by curtailing early voting days and hours.

All these restrictions disproportionately impact young, elderly and minority voters. Obama beat John McCain in early voting in Florida in 2008, so it is being restricted. In Ohio, blacks, traditionally Democratic voters, made up more than one half of the early in-person voting in 2008 so it is being restricted.

Voter suppression laws are justified by supporters as remedying the problem of voter fraud, which turns out to be virtually nonexistent. Study after study has found it to be an urban myth.

George W. Bush’s Justice Department found 86 cases nationwide in five years and a study by the National Association of Republican Lawyers found 350 cases in all 50 states over a 10-year period, less than one case on average per state per year. Florida’s purge of illegal immigrants registered to vote found 207 cases, out of 11.5 million registered voters, and only one case has been prosecuted.

It is hard to know how all these factors will play out on Nov. 6, but 2012 may be trickier than most presidential elections as a result of one old and a couple of new complications.

Bruce Mallard is a political science professor at Armstrong Atlantic State University.